Woburn, MA, November 6, 2017 – Today, Kaspersky Lab is announcing the availability of its latest Q3 2017 DDoS Intelligence Report, which reveals that the share of Linux botnets is continuing to grow – accounting for 70 percent of attacks in Q3, compared to 51 percent in Q2.
Woburn, MA, November 6, 2017 – Today, Kaspersky Lab is announcing the availability of its latest Q3 2017 DDoS Intelligence Report, which reveals that the share of Linux botnets is continuing to grow – accounting for 70 percent of attacks in Q3, compared to 51 percent in Q2. Additionally, experts continued to see an increase in the number of countries where resources have been targeted, with 98 countries subjected to DDoS attacks, an increase from 86 countries in Q2.
Also highlighted in the report is the top 10 countries in terms of number of targets, in which Russia moved up from seventh to fourth place. Meanwhile, the top 10 most popular host countries for botnet command servers this quarter included Italy and the United Kingdom, displacing Canada and Germany. In both cases, China, South Korea and the United States, continued to top the leaderboards as the most popular countries for hosting inexpensive data centers.
Cybercriminal strategies have also changed over the last quarter to more sophisticated attacks that are more sophisticated. For example, in the third quarter, the WireX botnet that spread via legitimate Android apps was taken down, and ‘Pulse Wave’ technology, which increases the power of DDoS attacks using a vulnerability in hybrid and cloud technologies, was revealed. Also noted in the report is an increase in the number of mixed attacks, in which criminals used multiple methods simultaneously.
Kaspersky Lab experts also saw a growing number of attacks on gaming and new financial services. A variety of gaming services were affected by DDoS attacks, such as Final Fantasy, Blizzard Entertainment, American Cardroom and the UK National Lottery. Additionally, the report shows an increase in the number of DDoS attacks targeting platforms conducting new financial services, such as initial coin offerings (ICOs) – an initial deployment of tokens using blockchain technology. Such DDoS attacks are aimed at either discrediting these services, or worse, serving as a distracting maneuver during ordinary theft.
"Entertainment and financial services – businesses that are critically dependent on their continuous availability to users – have always been a favorite target for DDoS attacks,” said Kirill Ilganaev, head of Kaspersky DDoS protection at Kaspersky Lab. “For these services, the downtime caused by an attack can result not only in significant financial losses but also reputational risks that could result in an exodus of customers to competitors. It’s not surprising that gaming services with multi-million dollar turnovers attract the attention of criminals and that new types of financial sites have come under attack. What is surprising, however, is that many companies still don’t pay enough attention to professional protection against DDoS attacks. The recommended approach for these companies is to delegate protection from DDoS attacks to a reliable supplier with deep knowledge of cyberthreats and the methods of combating them, and to reassign the IT resources that are freed up to the development of the business.”
To access the full Q3 2017 DDoS Intelligence report, read our Securelist post here.
*The DDoS Intelligence system (part of Kaspersky DDoS Protection) is designed to intercept and analyze commands sent to bots from command and control (C&C) servers, and does not have to wait until user devices are infected or cybercriminal commands are executed in order to gather data. It is important to note that DDoS Intelligence statistics are limited to those botnets that were detected and analyzed by Kaspersky Lab.
About Kaspersky Lab
Kaspersky Lab is a global cybersecurity company celebrating its 20 year anniversary in 2017. Kaspersky Lab’s deep threat intelligence and security expertise is constantly transforming into security solutions and services to protect businesses, critical infrastructure, governments and consumers around the globe. The company’s comprehensive security portfolio includes leading endpoint protection and a number of specialized security solutions and services to fight sophisticated and evolving digital threats. Over 400 million users are protected by Kaspersky Lab technologies and we help 270,000 corporate clients protect what matters most to them. Learn more at www.kaspersky.com.
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Media Contact:
Denise Bertrand
781.503.1836
Denise.Bertrand@kaspersky.com
